Getting Sideways - Landscape, Slide-Out Physical Keyboard on the Samsung SGH-T699

Samsung's next offering has been the subject of a huge tract of speculation and guesswork over the past few months. Many have been expecting a physical keyboard behemoth, powered with a monstrous processor and having the technical capability to compete in the Blackberry-dominated QWERTY smartphone market. These people may be somewhat underwhelmed by the Samsung SGH-T699, but it looks like a decent little handset anyway.

Offering a 5mp camera, a Snapdragon processor, a 720 x1280 display, the Ice Cream Sandwich operating system and of course a landscape-orientated, slide out physical keyboard, the SGH-T699 is not exactly a heavyweight. However it will appeal to business users who want a nippy little machine with a full five-row QWERTY attached. The keyboard looks decent enough, but Samsung know that they need to live up to Blackberry's supreme front-facing ergonomics and the landscape based Nokias which once ruled the market.

Some of the greatest QWERTY phones have boasted the same form - a full physical keyboard slides out from beneath the screen unit, resulting in an easily accessible array of keys with enough space between them for even the clumsiest thumbs. Samsung's own smartphones have followed this format - the Captivate Glide has a preposterous name but has been well received, the Epic 4G is a bit of a toy but still has a physical keyboard, while the Stratosphere was the only real physical keyboard offering for Verizon customers in the USA.

Trying to shoehorn a physical keyboard onto a small chassis doesn't work, so Samsung's offering is likely to be chunkier than its touchscreen or front-facing keyboard counterparts. The amount of speculation and conversation that this leak has caused is a good indication of how badly the market wants a physical keyboard on upcoming smartphones. The Samsung SGH-T699 might not have answered all our problems, but it's getting there.

Related: The Huawei M660 is another low-budget physical keyboard smartphone, this time with a front-facing QWERTY layout. But why are manufacturers concentrating on the featherweight end of the market? US and European consumers are desperate for a powerful contender.